God promised that if we keep His laws, then He will provide rain, the Land will give plenty of produce and we will not suffer any physical threat from enemies.
More blessings are promised if we follow God’s will. Wild beasts will withdraw from the Land and our enemies “will fall before us”. God will make us fruitful and multiply our numbers.
The parasha continues with further blessings if we choose the right path – a huge abundance of crops and a tangible sense of God’s presence amongst us: “I will walk among you, I will be God unto you and you will be a people unto Me”. However, it then continues with the tochacha, the Passage of Retribution, which is recited in an undertone by the person reading from the Torah. If we do not listen to God and do not observe the mitzvot, the consequences will be grave. Five stages of punishments are listed. These include: being captured by enemies, the Land being unproductive, livestock being destroyed, famine, hunger and being chased from the Land but finding no comfort on foreign soils. Eventually, however, God will remember His covenant with the forefathers. He will never fully reject Israel.
One is able to make a vow pledging to give one’s monetary value or the monetary value of someone else, to the Temple. These gifts are referred to as erechin (‘valuations’). The amount is based on a list of fixed values depending upon age and gender. After designating an animal to be brought as an offering, one is not allowed to try to switch its status to another animal.
The Torah details how to ‘redeem’ a house or field. This includes calculating the amount of time left until the Jubilee year (Yovel) at the point of redemption.
A firstborn animal is dedicated from birth to be a Temple offering. If a person dedicated a non-kosher animal to the Temple, he must redeem it and bring its monetary value instead, after adding a fifth to its value.
Certain types of agricultural tithes can be redeemed if an additional fifth of the original value is added.